Weimar surfaces : urban visual culture in 1920s Germany

376 Pages·2001·15.235 MB·English

by  Ward, Janet

Weimar Surfaces
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Weimar and Now:German Cultural Criticism
Edward Dimendberg,Martin Jay,and Anton Kaes,General Editors
1. Heritage of Our Times,by Ernst Bloch
2. TheNietzsche Legacy in Germany,1890–1990,by Steven E.
Aschheim
3. The Weimar Republic Sourcebook,edited by Anton Kaes,Martin Jay,
and Edward Dimendberg
4. Batteries of Life:On the History of Things and Their Perception in
Modernity,by Christoph Asendorf
5. Profane Illumination:Walter Benjamin and the Paris of Surrealist
Revolution,by Margaret Cohen
6. Hollywood in Berlin:American Cinema and Weimar Germany,by
Thomas J.Saunders
7. Walter Benjamin:An Aesthetic of Redemption,by Richard Wolin
8. The New Typography,by Jan Tschichold,translated by Ruari McLean
9. The Rule of Law under Siege:Selected Essays of Franz L.Neumann
and Otto Kirchheimer,edited by William E.Scheuerman
10. The Dialectical Imagination:A History of the Frankfurt School and
the Institute of Social Research,1923–1950,by Martin Jay
11. Women in the Metropolis:Gender and Modernity in Weimar Cul-
ture,edited by Katharina von Ankum
12. Letters of Heinrich and Thomas Mann,1900–1949,edited by Hans
Wysling,translated by Don Reneau
13. Empire of Ecstasy:Nudity and Movement in German Body Culture,
1910–1935,by Karl Toepfer
14. In the Shadow of Catastrophe:German Intellectuals between Apoca-
lypse and Enlightenment,by Anson Rabinbach
15. Walter Benjamin’s Other History:Of Stones,Animals,Human
Beings,and Angels,by Beatrice Hanssen
16. Exiled in Paradise:German Refugee Artists and Intellectuals in
America from the 1930s to the Present,by Anthony Heilbut
17. Cool Conduct:The Culture of Distance in Weimar Germany,by Hel-
mut Lethen,translated by Don Reneau
18. In a Cold Crater:Cultural and Intellectual Life in Berlin,1945–1948,
by Wolfgang Schivelbusch,translated by Kelly Barry
19. A Dubious Past:Ernst Jünger and the Politics of Literature after
Nazism,by Elliot Y.Neaman
20. Beyond the Conceivable:Studies on Germany,Nazism,and the
Holocaust,by Dan Diner
21. Prague Territories:National Conflict and Cultural Innovation in
Franz Kafka’s Fin de Siècle,by Scott Spector
22. Munich and Memory:Architecture,Monuments,and the Legacy of
the Third Reich,by Gavriel D.Rosenfeld
23. The UFA Story:A History of Germany’s Greatest Film Company,
1918–1945,by Klaus Kreimeier,translated by Robert and Rita
Kimber
24. From Monuments to Traces:Artifacts of German Memory,
1870–1990,by Rudy Koshar
25. We Weren’t Modern Enough:Women Artists and the Limits of Ger-
man Modernism,by Marsha Maskimmon
26. Culture and Inflation in Weimar Germany,by Bernd Widdig
27. Weimar Surfaces:Urban Visual Culture in 1920s Germany,by Janet
Ward
Weimar Surfaces
Urban Visual Culture in 1920s Germany
janet ward
University of California Press
berkeley los angeles london
University of California Press
Berkeley and Los Angeles,California
University of California Press,Ltd.
London,England
© 2001by the Regents of the University of California
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Ward,Janet,1963–.
Weimar surfaces :urban visual culture in 1920s Germany / Janet Ward.
p. cm.—(Weimar and now ;27)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn0-520-22298-9 (cloth :alk.paper)—isbn0-520-22299-7
(pbk.:alk paper)
1.Arts,German. 2.Arts,Modern—20th century—Germany.
3.Modernism (Aesthetics)—Germany. 4.Popular culture—
Germany—Influence. 5.Germany—History—1918–1933.
I.Title.II.Series.
nx550.a1 w37 2001
306.4′7′094309042—dc21
00–055963
Manufactured in the United States of America
10 09 08 07 06 05 04 03 02 01
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
ansi / niso z39 0.48-1992(r 1997)(Permanence of Paper). ∞
For my parents,
Joan and Alfred Ward,
with love and gratitude
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Contents
Acknowledgments xv
introduction modern surface and postmodern
simulation:a retrospective retrieval 1
Agendas of Surface and Simulacrum,1;
Weimar Surfaces Now,8;Tactility in the
City,14;Exhibiting Superficies,18;
Philosophies of Counterfeit,24;Resistances
to Weimar Surface,37;Surface,Academy,and
World,41
chapter 1. functionalist façades:
the reformation of weimar
architecture 45
The Building’s New Face,45;Decoration Do’s
and Don’ts,52;Brave New World,56;Glass
Culture,62;The Pains of Tabula Rasa,69;
Surface Art at Home,74;Fashioning the Female
Body,81
chapter 2. electric stimulations:the shock
of the new objectivity in weimar
advertising 92
Advertising as Power,92;Electric Modernity,
101;The Architecture of Light,110;Shock
Treatments,116;“Light Lures People,”128;
Rejecting the Modern,133;The Embrace of the
Avant-Garde,136;Postmodernity and the Space
of Advertising,140